A 26-year-old man has died after he suffered critical injuries when he crashed his car into a tree, leaving him trapped inside the vehicle, near Gurnee early Saturday morning.
The Gurnee Fire Department and Lake County Sheriff’s Office responded around 2:05 a.m. Saturday to the area of Stearns School Road and Mill Creek Drive in unincorporated Gurnee for a vehicle crash with entrapment.
Sheriff’s deputies arrived and found a Mercedes-Benz sedan with heavy damage.
Lake County Sheriff’s Office Deputy Chief Christopher Covelli said a preliminary investigation shows the Mercedes-Benz was traveling eastbound on Stearns School Road approaching Mill Creek Drive.
The driver, a 26-year-old Gurnee man, drove off the south side of the roadway and struck a tree, Covelli said.
The driver’s side of the vehicle sustained a significant amount of damage.
Covelli said it appears the driver was not wearing a seat belt. He was trapped in the wreckage.
Firefighters extricated the man from the vehicle and paramedics transported him to Advocate Condell Medical Center in Libertyville.
Covelli said the man suffered critical, life-threatening injuries.
Lake County Chief Deputy Coroner Steve Newton confirmed to Lake and McHenry County Scanner that the victim had died in the hospital.
The Lake County Coroner’s Office has scheduled an autopsy on the man for Monday. His identity has not been released yet.
The cause of the crash remains under investigation by the Lake County Sheriff’s Office Technical Crash Investigations Team.